Senior Nick Abbott Awarded Summit's Scholar Athlete

Senior Nick Abbott was named this year’s scholar athlete for maintaining a 4.426 GPA at Summit High School, while holding captain positions on the Summit wrestling, soccer and baseball teams.

Abbott was awarded Outstanding Wrestler in the District this past wrestling season and also achieved his 100^th varsity win of his wrestling career.

Although Abbott started out playing soccer at age four, he said he is probably the best at wrestling, which he started in the fifth grade. He began wrestling due to a push from his father who wrestled 3rd in the state of New York during his high school years and also wrestled in college.

Abbott added that he still enjoys playing soccer and baseball more than wrestling.

Abbott has been on the varsity wrestling team all four years; he was a starting forward on the varsity soccer team for two years and the leading goal scorer for the team. Also, Abbott has been a starting varsity center fielder on the baseball team for three years and is among the top leaders on the team in batting average, stolen bases, slugging percentage and outfield assists.

Depending on what college he will attend, Abbott said he might try and join the school’s wrestling team. Adding that balancing a major in engineering and being on a wrestling team will be difficult work but he’s up for the challenge.

Even though Abbott is not completely looking forward to leaving Summit High School, he thinks it will be exciting to start college but also a lot of work.

“I’m really not excited to leave the High School,” Abbott said. “It’s bittersweet.”

Abbott has applied to 11 colleges, five of which are Ivy League and he hopes to attend University of Pennsylvania to participate in their dual-degree to gain a bachelor’s in engineering and a business degree from the Wharton School.

If Abbott gets into his dream school, UPenn, he might try to walk on to the wrestling team but they have a really good program and he is looking to only walk on low division one teams or division three teams.

“Maybe I’d walk on that [the UPenn team],” he said. “That would be crazy.” 

He said that he really hoped to do better this wrestling season and make it to the state championship, but he fell a bit short.

However, he said one of the highlights of his senior wrestling season was winning the districts with only 30 seconds left to a Seton Hall wrestler who was supposed to beat him.

Abbott said maintaining a high GPA and participating in three sports, marching band, wind ensemble, the ultimate Frisbee club and volunteer efforts is all about time management. 

Sometimes, he’ll even wake up at 4 a.m. or 5 a.m. to do his homework, he added.

It became tough sometimes to keep up with his schoolwork and athletics, Abbot pointed out; there would be some stretches where he was getting little sleep.

Although, when it came to the breaks in-between seasons, Abbott found himself unaware of what to do with the free time.

“I’m the kind of person who likes to be busy,” he said. “Being active is pretty much wired into my makeup.”

Abbott should be finding out what colleges he was accepted into at the end of March or beginning of April.

Check back with summit.patch.com for more on Nick Abbott and other Summit High School student athletes.